Last June, my friends at the Honest Elections Project and I took Jocelyn Benson to court and this week we held her accountable.

Our federal lawsuit sought to force the Secretary of State to comply with the National Voter Registration Act.

The bombshell exploded late Thursday.

An aide to New York Governor Andrew Cuomo admitted to lawmakers on a video conference call that the state covered up the number of nursing home deaths from COVID-19 in order to avoid prosecution over their disastrous policy.

Wednesday evening, Governor Gretchen Whitmer took to the airwaves to deliver her third State of the State address. She lobbed a few talking points from the Biden administration, hyped the new President’s slogan, and talked a lot about bipartisanship.

We caught up with Lynn Afendoulis, press secretary for Speaker Wentworth, Beth DeShone, Executive Director of the Great Lakes Education Project and Tori Sachs, Executive Director of Michigan Rising Action for their reactions to Gov. Whitmer’s lackluster address. You can hear what they had to say in the latest edition of our podcast, “In the Trenches.”

Michigan families are facing unprecedented challenges. They’ve been told they’re not allowed to go to work. Their kids aren’t allowed to go to school. They’re lectured and belittled if they go to church. Vaccines that could save their lives are going unused, sitting on freezer shelves.

Larger gatherings? Forget about it. They’re illegal. Governor Whitmer says so. (Didn’t stop her from spending inauguration day with thousands of strangers in Washington, D.C., though. Apparently, her pandemic orders don’t apply in our nation’s capital.)

Restaurant workers are still out of a job. Despite declining COVID infection and hospitalization rates, Governor Gretchen Whitmer this week announced another extension of her unilateral order, taking cooks out of the kitchen and dropping them onto the unemployment line.

"It's a pause that continues to not have a plan — and we're 75 days in now," Justin Winslow, president and CEO of the Michigan Restaurant & Lodging Association told Crain’s Detroit Business. "It can't be the data. So what is it?"

Governor Gretchen Whitmer is misleading the media, and she is misleading you.

Earlier this week, reporters learned that the state had distributed only about 27% of the COVID-19 vaccine it had on hand, with somewhere in the neighborhood of 551,000 doses sitting idly, unused in freezers across the state.

Thank you for partnering with us on this journey.

We know it hasn’t been an easy year. But our state, and our citizens, are strong.

The Redistricting Commission reaffirmed that it works for you – the citizens of Michigan.

Yesterday, the state’s new Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission met to consider a group of candidates to fill the body’s General Counsel position.

One of those candidates, James Lancaster, is a Democrat with a long history of financial support and activism in support of Democratic party candidates and causes.

Earlier this week, you spoke out, and Lansing heard you.

As lawmakers wrestled with their “lame duck” legislative agenda, we got word a major push was underway to resuscitate an obnoxious, tone deaf, and expensive tax dollar giveaway to some of the state’s biggest, best-connected corporations – and everyday taxpayers and small businesses would foot the bill.

Two years ago, Michigan voters went to the polls and approved a constitutional amendment to change the way our state handles redistricting.

Voters opted to give redistricting responsibility to something called an “Independent Citizens Redistricting Commission.” According to the rules voters agreed to, the commission would be led by Republicans, Democrats, and Independents, and it would be designed to function independently of partisan political interests.